THE FROZEN HARVEST OF 1907 341 



I think it must have been one Monday morning 

 and that there had probably been tea and conver- 

 sation after church the day before. 



" Have you ordered the fuel for the winter ? " he 

 asked. 



" Ordered the fuel ! What do you mean ? " 



" Our arrangement wsls that you should find me 

 w^inter fuel, and I must see it all in before you leave. 

 The neighbours tell me that I shall require seventeen 

 loads." 



" Do they ! Then it is certain that I had better 

 abandon my intention of going since I don't see 

 you felling, cleaning, and hauling seventeen loads 

 of wood in seventeen centuries of Sundays unless 

 a miracle arrives to your method. I used six, but 

 that's outside the argument. I am perfectly willing 

 to pay for seventeen or twenty-seven loads for you 

 if necessary, but you must understand that you have 

 to fell it, and to clean, and to haul it with my horses. 

 I have arranged to pay the Hudson Bay Company 

 a dollar a load to cut from their reserve. Roddy 

 McMahon says you can go along with him when 

 he is out with the others felling and packing, and you 

 can haul it home as you need it." 



" I am sorry, but I must have the whole of the 

 winter's fuel before you go. The neighbours 

 tell me that it is a matter of life and death — that 

 the risks of the winter are terrible indeed." 



" You and your family have been better housed 

 and fed and cared for since it has been more or less 

 my responsibility than the family of any neighbour 

 in the district, — and yet you find it necessary to 

 go to them for advice concerning my obligation 

 to you ! " I said angrily, and, in short, lost my 



